Page 79 of Daughter of the Dark Sun
Mireithren took Therat’s hand in hers and squeezed it hard before bending down to her knees. He followed, glancing at her with a questioning look but not resisting. There, on her knees in front of the terrible and beautiful Shadow-Queen Pherisa, Mireithren made her choice.
“We could never deny your most divine gift, Your Majesty, whose blood runs with the blessing of my eternal Goddess, Lady Eithranren. This is what She would want; of this I am certain.” Mireithren heard the words from her mouth, but they did not sound like hers. Nothing made sense right now.
Was this the right choice? Lost and struggling against the tides of fate, it became the only choice. Therat would live. He must.
The Shadow-Queen Pherisa walked back to the top of the dais, the Queen Consort by her side. She raised her hand again and the murmurs of the crows vanished.
“To the Court of Shadows, I submit the following request: ascension for the Son Returned and the Daughter Promised. What say ye, my Court of Night and Shadow?”
The Queen’s voice reverberated throughout the grand throne room. A moment later the crowd all shouted “ascend, ascend!” in unison, their glittering smiles engulfing Mireithren in a wave of emotion.
Please let this be the way to save my love.
thirty-seven
A Life Given
The two days betweentheir audience with the Shadow-Queen Pherisa and the ascension ritual passed by in a blur. Mireithren and Therat met again with the Oracle, who shared more of her visions. They spent the rest of their time with Laisha, who guided them throughout the grand palace grounds. The pale woman shared much of the city’s history and the lineages of the divine children who ruled the Western lands.
The Aesirhelí, she called her people: the Truth Hunters. Laisha spoke of the First Era and its dying days, when the youth of the world faded and the once undying children of gods came to know fear and mortality. Deep sorrow ran through her words, the pain of a Goddess borne forever in the hearts of her people. Mireithren remembered the mournful dirge of Cídhen’s Rest, how the very sun itself seemed to weep for the dead lover of a god. These people were not quite so different from her own, in a way.
Laisha spoke of how Death claimed Evran, the silver-haired consort of Eithranren, and how her sons journeyed east searching for its source—the Goddess Aslyren, who had long coveted the domain of her youngest sister and the light she created. It was strange, viewing the Dark Goddess as a creator and the first soul to know grief. Long had the world held her as the source of death and pain in their hearts.
The morning of the ascension ritual came on the first day of the new year, when the moon did not show in the sky. The Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year. A day when the walls of the void prison holding Eithranren’s soul faded and she touched all who lived on Eás.
Long had Mireithren feared and hated this day, the second worst day of the year after her nameday. How appropriate that it would become the start of the rest of her life.
Laisha droned on about the various details of the ritual, but Mireithren found it hard to listen. Somewhere in her heart, a feeling told her she chose the wrong path.
You already knew what to do.
But the Oracle remained adamant: a child would come—Eithranren reborn—and a sacrifice paid. If ascension saved Therat, it meant everything to Mireithren.
However, the cost of immortality came with a dear blood-price nearly impossible to reconcile. Enslaving another in thisworld was one thing—their torment and suffering would end, and Death would come for them in time—but tying a soul forever to the Undying Realm Beyond was something else entirely. The Aesirhelí sacrificed millions for their twisted eternal lives, bodies trapped in a pocket of time acting as a conduit for the radiant music of the First Harmonic.
Sympathetics, they called them: the secret to the immortality of the Aesirhelí. Why every soul on the palace grounds walked with an ageless grace and a smooth complexion. Only their eyes betrayed how many thousands of years they won at the cost of another living in torment for eternity.
And now, two more souls would find themselves forever shuttered away in the Undying Realm Beyond while their masters escaped Death.
It was a cruelty unlike anything in the world. Mireithren had no choice. Only now did she understand Laisha’s words: the Aesirhelí hunt for the truth no matter the cost. The thought of it made her stomach flip.
The beauty of the day could not erase Mireithren’s grief. The sun shone bright in the blue sky, no clouds in sight. Mireithren could see her breath in the crisp air of the first day of winter. It sparkled in the sunlight as it drifted with the wind. The woman had never seen such a sight before or felt such a deep, freezing cold.
Therat stood beside Mireithren, the two dressed in the same simple white robes. A grim look painted his face, hand tight around hers. They stood in a large courtyard, glowing trees of silver rising high above them. White birds flew through the tree boughs and arches of the path running through the center of the garden square, their song soft on the air.
The young lovers spoke little the last two days, even after the raucous activity of the day ended and they found solitude in their room. Therat often sat at a large arched window facing westover an angry sea of black water, thumbing a pendant around his ankle. Mireithren left him to his thoughts. She could only imagine how he fared. The blood of Eithranren flowed in his veins, the same as the Shadow-Queen herself. Now, the Oracle insisted his seed would bring that same Goddess back to life. It would be enough to send anyone to madness.
“Is this what you truly want, Mireithren?” he said, glancing down at her as they stopped on the courtyard path.
“All I want is you. Safe, alive, at my side. No matter the price, I will pay it over and over until I have nothing left to give.”
Mireithren bristled at the thought of Therat denying her this wish. Didn’t he know how her heart would break if he died? Or even worse, how his own would shatter and the darkness consume the man if she left his side? This was for the best, she kept telling herself. She saw no other way.
“I hope you are right. I can’t help but feel like no one here knows the full truth. What if this is a mistake?”
“How can immortality be a mistake, Therat?”
“You know I will always follow you, Little Siren.”
